Blood of the Reich

17

The air over western China

September 9, 1938

T he Corsair biplane had two cockpits. Hood would sit in front of Beth Calloway as she piloted, in a basket about as comfortable as a barrel: a metal seat, hard ribs, and welded flange to hang on to behind a snarling engine. It was 1,400 miles to Lhasa, and each one was going to be bumpy, cold, and noisy.

“We’ll fly close to the ground at first and put down if we spot any Japanese,” she said. “Then we’ll follow the Yangtze to Chongqing and break due west for Chengdu. After that, it’s mountains, mountains, mountains.”

“How high can this crate fly?” Its mustard yellow was spattered with mud from rough landings.

“More than eighteen thousand feet if we stay light. That’s high enough to clear any passes. Beyond that, you have to hike.”

“Just get me to Lhasa at twelve thousand. If I can reach the authorities fast enough, I can do what I’m supposed to do, I hope.”

She looked him over: jaunty Filson bush hat that would blow off if he didn’t put it away, oil cloth packer coat, a. 45 automatic that would identify him as an American, a bandolier of rifle and shotgun shells like some Mexican bandit, and high-lace mountaineering boots shiny with waterproof wax. All he lacked was a merit badge. In the humid heat, he was sweating. She pointed skeptically. “What’s that?”

He was shouldering his sling canvas duffel, fat as a sailor’s and long enough to stuff a body. He swung it off for presentation. “My gear. Where does it go?”

“It doesn’t. Not with us.”

“I’m going to need this in Tibet.”

Calloway swung open the door of a compartment behind her own seat. “You’re not getting to Tibet unless we carry these.” Three petrol canisters took up most of the space. “The Corsair’s maximum range is less than seven hundred miles. We’ve got two refueling spots, but we’ll have to put down and top off with these on the leg to Lhasa.”

“Then we need a bigger plane.”

“We don’t have a bigger plane, unless you packed one in that duffel.”

He frowned. “I miss the Clipper.”

“I miss flying by myself. What’s in there, anyway?”

Reluctantly, he handed her the bag, which bent her over with its weight. “You’re kidding, right?” She dropped it on the hangar dirt and began pulling the contents out. “No, no, no.” Shirts, underwear, trousers, and jackets were tossed to one side. So were extra boots, binoculars, compass, canteen, and sleeping bag.

“What are you doing?”

“Curbing weight and space. Here.” She picked out a sweater and threw it to him. “It will get cold past Chengdu. The rest is too bulky. What’s this?” She held up a bottle of single-malt scotch, Glenfiddich, which Sir Arthur had recommended.

“Replenishment.”

“Weight.” She tossed and it shattered.

“That’s twenty-year-old scotch!” She was a madwoman.

“The monks don’t need it and neither do we. And what’s this?” She pulled out two guns by the stock, a. 12-gauge shotgun and a Winchester Model 70 hunting rifle with scope. “Jesus Lord. Going hunting again?”

“In a manner of speaking. Those we do bring.”

“No room, college boy.”

“I’ve already been strafed on this trip.”

“No room.”

“You carry a pistol.”

“And so do you. We’ve no room for long guns.”

“They go in the cockpit with me. We’ll leave you behind if we have to.”

She put her hands on her hips. “You’re going to fly this plane by yourself?”

He looked her up and down. “How hard can it be?”

The insult won a smirk, her first concession of respect. She nodded reluctantly. “You bring a Zero down with one of these and I’ll be impressed. So let’s do a trade for these guns. Something else has to go.” She stepped up on the wing, reached into his cockpit, and hauled out a pack and harness. “This will give you more room, and incentive to aim true.”

“What’s that?”

“Your parachute. We’ll leave it here.”

“Great. What are you bringing?”

“The clothes I’m wearing, a box of tools, and chewing gum. And my parachute, since I travel light. You got money?”

“Chinese gold.”

“Don’t show it. Use a money belt. But you can buy robes and boots in Tibet for pennies on the dollar. Guns, too, I imagine.”

“I like my own.”

She gave him a leather flying hood, goggles, and white silk scarf. “Bugs and grit can hit like bullets when you fly. The scarf is to prevent chafing when you crane your neck. I want you looking for Japs the first hundred miles. When you get to the Potala Palace you can give it to the regent. Trading scarves is custom in Tibet; they call the scarf a khata. Now, be useful. You can turn the prop.”

“We are in the Dark Ages.”

“Don’t do it until you get my signal. And step backward once it spins. I don’t want hamburger all over my plane.”

The engine roared to life, spitting a plume of black smoke. The propeller turned into a blur. He walked around the biplane wings to look at what the aviatrix was doing. Inside her cockpit was a stick, a pair of foot pedals, and a throttle. He would fly, if he had to.

“Here, use this!” she shouted over the roar of the engine. It was a jar of Vaseline she was smearing on her checks. “Fights windburn. Tibetan herders use red cream made from whey, but it stinks like hell and makes them look like demons.”

He smeared his face, climbed up on the lower wing, and swung himself into his cockpit. Even with the parachute gone, it was a tight fit with his firearms. Their barrels pointed up, rattling with the vibration.

Beth pushed the silver throttle and the biplane shuddered and began to move. Then she used the rudder pedals to turn and soon they were bouncing down the dirt runway. The engine roared, climbing toward a whine, and they raced, skipping now. Then a pull of the joystick and they lumbered into the air, a posse of Chinese children running after them and waving.

Could have carried another fifty pounds, Hood thought sourly, but his spirits lifted with the plane. Maybe he could still catch Raeder. Houses turned to toys below. People became insects. He settled back for the ride. It was too noisy to talk.

The view was panoramic, the wind bracing, and the experience entirely different from the Clipper. He felt as farsighted as a bird. China became a green quilt buttoned with tile and thatch roofs. They skimmed just a few hundred feet above, peasants pausing to peer up at them. Behind, on the horizon, plumes of smoke rose from the Sino-Japanese front.

Hood did spot the wink of sun on a plane back toward the war, so as precaution he took up his rifle, opened the bolt, and slid in a shell. He turned half around, resting the barrel on the rim of the cockpit.

Calloway pushed it aside. “Idiot!” she shouted. “You’ll take my head off before you hit something going three hundred miles an hour! I was joking about downing a Zero. Put it away!”

He saluted but rested the butt of his Winchester on the floor of his cockpit again, safety set, one hand on its stock. If a fighter came near him again, he was going down shooting.

The Yangtze was a broad silt road, third-longest river in the world. As they flew east the land grew hillier, China a hazed, rolling ocean. Everything from steamships to sampans crawled below, peasants stooping and oxen plodding in a tableau that hadn’t changed in a thousand years. Then the land rose still more and they began flying through a succession of magnificent ravines, green mountains rising higher than their wings.

“The Wu Gorge!” Calloway shouted. Forested mountainsides reared like the skyscraper canyons of New York. The sediment-laden river twisted like an orange intestine. Villages clung to narrow shelves still in shadow.

Somewhere ahead was Raeder.

T hey spent their first night in Chongqing, Hood dazed and stiff from the long hours of engine noise, fumes, wind, and cramping. He paid the pittance it cost to buy them two rooms at a makeshift inn near the grass runway. It was dim inside-electricity hadn’t reached this far-and smoky from the charcoal brazier. Calloway looked weary from the day’s flight, and was about as flirtatious as Eleanor Roosevelt. She bolted her rice and vegetables like a dog. Hood tried to make conversation.

“You’re a smart-mouth like my sister. I enjoy that.”

She snorted. “Your sister.”

“How’d you learn to fly?”

She looked at him tiredly. “Watched some barnstormers and saved up for flying lessons.” Her reddened eyes wandered around the room, as if sociability was almost too much to endure.

That just made it interesting. “Shows initiative.”

“It’s called gumption in Nebraska.”

“And you’re a girl.”

“Quite the observation, deadeye.”

“It’s unusual, that’s all.”

“We’re half the population. And unusual isn’t impossible. I wanted to do more than peel spuds and have babies.”

He waited for her to ask more about him, but she didn’t, so he plunged on. “It’s a long way from Nebraska to the Chinese air force.”

Beth looked at him directly this time, over the rim of her teacup. “You are educated. So, okay. I’m a tomboy, a runaway, and a mercenary. And the weather’s better.”

“Everywhere’s better than Nebraska.”

“And the money’s good.”

“Yes, your wealth is apparent.”

She chewed. “You haven’t seen my closet full of shoes.”

He smiled at the joke. Progress.

“I also get to work for a woman.”

“Madame Chiang?”

“Remarkable, isn’t she?”

“Forceful. And so are you, Miss Calloway. You’ve flown me five hundred miles and haven’t strayed off course once.”

“How would you know? Besides, I was following the Yangtze.”

“That shows wisdom right there.”

“You don’t need to flatter me, Mr. Hood. I’m not impressed by your museum, your money, your conversation, or your skill at killing helpless animals. I’m far too tired to want to sleep with you, and too well read to expect anything you say to be particularly enlightening. You’re an assignment.”

“You flatter me. I thought I was a mere chore.” Yes, progress. She’d volunteered more than one sentence in a row.

“The leg to Chengdu is two hundred miles shorter, but you’ll excuse me for going to bed. I’m guessing you’d rather have me alert tomorrow. And I’m sure you can fascinate yourself.” She stood.

Hood remained seated. “Do something by myself, anyway.” He threw her a few gold coins. “For the first leg of the trip.”

She didn’t pick them up. “We leave at dawn.”

T hey went on at six A.M., the plane bouncing as they slowly climbed west. It was another long, cramped day, and after landing at Chengdu and refueling, Hood wearily sat with his back against the tail of the plane, watching the sun go down in a haze of fire behind the mountains to the west. He’d stuffed cotton in his ears beneath his helmet for the flight, but they still rang from the long hours in the air.

Calloway had been her usual laconic self upon landing, wordlessly directing coolies to gas up the plane and checking an engine that ticked as it cooled. Most people got to Hood’s family and money sooner rather than later, but she’d shown no interest in either. She was professional, guarded, and working hard to be unimpressed. Hood considered that a sign of character, but still.

Beth finally wiped her hands with a rag and stood in front of him. “Are you just going to lean on my plane, or find us a place to sleep?”

“I’m postponing the inevitable. There are more fleas inside than out.”

“I think you’re sulking because I broke your scotch.”

He looked up at her, squinting against the late glare of the sun. “And I think you were showing off by breaking it.”

She bit her lip. “So were you, by bringing it. I knew what it cost.”

He looked back down across the airfield. Pretty women had the luxury of being annoying, and she was managing to annoy him. Pepsodent my ass. “Sorry to have offended you.”

Beth suddenly looked hesitant and abruptly walked around the plane again, thrumming the wire wing supports for tension. Then she plopped next to him on the grass. “Look, it was stupid.”

He studied her, the girl too tough to ever risk being hurt. “You don’t allow yourself to enjoy much, do you?”

“I don’t allow myself to be disappointed. It’s a fault.” She shook out her curls to loosen them from the packing of the helmet. Of course she didn’t go so far as to actually look at him or offer a pleasantry. That would be too polite.

But she didn’t move away, either. They both had goggle rings around their eyes, like raccoons.

She stared at the sky, too.

“I never knew riding could be so tiring,” Hood finally tried again.

Silence.

“I’m still vibrating from the engine. It doesn’t go away.”

More quiet. Then, “Ready to walk, college boy?”

“Why do you call me that? I’m a specimen collector, not an intellectual. You already claimed you’re a reader as well, though damned if I’ve noticed any evidence of it.”

“I was reciting Thucydides all day. You just couldn’t hear over the engine.”

“Baloney. I’ll bet the only thing you’ve ever read is Ladies’ Home Journal and engine manuals.”

“ Ladies’ Home Journal! ” She barked a laugh. Then she finally looked at him to recite, proud as a schoolgirl. “ The secret of happiness is freedom. The secret of freedom is courage. Thucydides said that.”

“ E Pluribus Unum. A nickel says that. See? We’re both eggheads.”

She finally laughed. “Out of many, one.”

“But you’re the lonely aviatrix.”

“I just rely on myself.”

“And you’re free.”

“To a point.”

“And courageous.”

“To a point.”

“And contemptuous of any man who isn’t you.”

She seemed warily interested in his assessment. “Women, too.”

“I’ve never sat home counting stock coupons, which I could afford to do.” He knew he sounded defensive. “I’m paying my own way on a mission for my government. I’m in the middle of nowhere, going to find a man I’d just as soon forget. It takes courage to fly in a plane like yours, with a pilot like you, in a place like this, but I don’t feel free at all.”

“Or happy?”

“The best I’ve managed is to be amused.”

“So what the devil are you doing here, Dr. Hood?” She was cross-legged and leaned forward a little, curious now.

“It’s secret, of course.” He could think of no better way to irritate her.

“To save the world,” she guessed. “It’s got to be something important to fly to the end of the earth.”

“Why do you care?”

“You’ve taken me with you. It only seems I’m taking you.”

He plucked at the grass, recognizing the truth of that. He considered how to answer her. “All anyone ever manages is to save themselves-I know that. But give me credit for doing what I can. The fact is, the luck of my birth embarrasses me. I envy ordinary people.”

“Then you’re a fool.”

“People are happier being ordinary.”

“Nonsense. You’re the kind of man who does everything he can to keep from being ordinary. I’ve seen your type in China a hundred times. Terrified of being bored. Deliberately eccentric to fit the adventure stereotype. Achievement as penance.”

“Penance for what?”

“You tell me.”

“For being envied by people like you.” He looked square at her as he said it.

That stopped her for a moment. Then she nodded. “So tell me, Dr. Benjamin Grayson Hood. What are you really doing here? Why go to Lhasa now? Nobody goes to Lhasa.”

“The Nazis have sent an expedition to Tibet.”

“Nazis!”

“SS officers. I’m to find out what they’re up to.”

She looked more puzzled than ever. “Why you?”

“I’ve been to the edge of Tibet twice before, on museum expeditions.”

“So the American, British, and Chinese governments send a curator?” It clearly made no sense to her.

“When we came before, we had an international group. One of the scientists was a German named Kurt Raeder. An able mountain climber, crack shot, and trained zoologist like me. It was a natural partnership.”

“You mean you know German?”

“Yes, but I mean I know Raeder. He’s the leader of this new Nazi group, coming back to a nation we visited before.”

“Ah. So you can approach him, as a friend, to learn what he’s up to.”

Hood gave a humorless smile. “Actually, he’s an enemy.”

This intrigued her. “Really? You had a falling-out? Tug-of-war over a carcass? Argument over the right scientific Latin name?”

She was teasing, but he decided to be honest. The truth was, she was risking her life just taking him there. And she was obviously intelligent. “Argument over a woman.”

“Ah.”

“Her name was Keyuri Lin. Her husband hired on as a porter and guide and she came with him to cook and clean. Raeder had his eye on her from the beginning; she’s very pretty. He and the husband were out one day and Mondro fell off a cliff. Or so Raeder said.”

“What do you mean?”

“Perhaps he was pushed. It was the first thing I thought, anyway.”

“That’s quite the accusation.”

“Maybe, but I didn’t like the guy. Too… driven.”

“Look who’s talking.”

“Raeder turned his consolation of Keyuri into something else pretty quick. He’s as striking as she is, and perhaps she’d encouraged him, either knowingly or unwittingly. You know how people are.”

“Lusty. Clumsy. Stupid.” Now she stretched out her legs. She had a fine set of them, and knew it.

“They no doubt hoped they could be discreet about the whole thing, but nothing is secret in an expedition camp. There was no evidence of murder, and ordinarily none of it would be my business. But then she began to look frightened.”

“Of what?”

“Raeder. I think there’s some Germanic dark spot on the man’s soul. He didn’t just want to possess her, he wanted to consume her, or hurt her, to make her a kind of slave. I warned him to be careful and he exploded at me, warning me off.”

“Is that so surprising?”

“No… but the change in his personality, the switch from dignity to rage, was so complete that I began carrying a loaded pistol even in camp. There’s something dark in him beyond the usual Nazi bravado. I was afraid he’d try something violent. Finally Keyuri crept to me at night and pleaded for rescue. She… showed me her body. There were cuts and burns and she feared for her life.”

Calloway gave him a sideways glance.

“I decided to fire him. But he was stirring the others against me, complaining I was trying to steal his woman, this fragile widow, and people began choosing sides. I feared it would rip the camp apart, and possibly result in violence. I… was wary of Raeder.”

“Chicken, you mean. And it’s been eating you ever since.”

Hood frowned at the assessment but didn’t dispute it. “So one night I simply took her and fled with some of the animals, leaving a note that my financial support of the expedition was over. Some blamed me for their failure to complete their scientific objectives. Raeder felt humiliated. And it was worse than that.”

Beth was enjoying the tale now, absorbed without pretending sympathy. Two men, one woman? Old story. “Worse how?”

“I fell in love with Keyuri myself. And eventually we made love, but we were all mixed up. The expedition had been derailed. She felt guilty about whether she might have played a role in the death of her husband. She was angry at Raeder, but embarrassed at having embarrassed him as well. The victim began to feel like the culprit. So one night she left me, too. It took quite a while to get over it.”

“And you are over it? This has nothing to do with why we’re flying to Tibet?”

“The last I heard, she’d entered a Buddhist nunnery.”

“So you’re going back to salt the wound.” It was a judgment. “Good move, college boy.”

“I’d just like to set things right.”

“You can’t set things right. That’s the whole point of history.”

“Well, this history is what you’re flying to, which is what you wanted to know. And maybe I can write the future.”

“What does that mean?”

“Keyuri is still there, as far as I know. I’m going back so Kurt Raeder doesn’t hurt anyone else, ever again.”